The 100 Day Project - Next Steps

Have you heard of the 100 Day Project?  The 100 Day Project is a free art project that takes place online.  You can choose any project you wish and do it for 100 days, sharing your process on Instagram.  If you follow us on Instagram or Facebook (search PGFiber2Art), you might recall that Sue participated in this project last year.  We were surprised to see that we hadn't done any blog posts about this, but all the pictures are on our Instagram page so you can always go back to see the daily pictures there.  Sue's project was to screen print on 5" squares - one print every day.  All of the prints use our original Thermofax screens, a portion of which are available in our Etsy shop.  So, what to do with those 100 prints? Well, part of her plan was to enhance the prints with either hand or machine stitching or both.  To that end, all the squares were backed with fusible fleece to provide some stability for stitching.  The first project from these squares was a 12" square 9-patch quilt that was donated to the SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) online auction.

These are the 9 squares that were put together after printing and stitching - if you click on the picture you should be able to see the stitching better.  Below is the finished piece.  Eyelash trim was couched over the seams for additional embellishment.

Sue has continued embellishing the squares with stitching and is nearing completion of her second project with the squares.  This one combines 20 of the prints that are all framed with brightly colored hand-dyed cottons.

Here's a group of 4 squares in the quilt.

The inner squares were first quilted with monofilament thread next to the borders.  The rest of the quilting is straight line quilting through the border squares with Superior Threads Rainbow variegated thread which has a one inch color change.

You can see the quilting better in this close up photo.  And the whole piece can be seen below.  Again, click on the picture for a better view.

Let us know what you think!  If you were to participate in the 100 Day Project, what project would you choose?  This year's project starts on April 7, so you have plenty of time to consider what you'd like to do!  

A word about the screen prints - as mentioned previously, these are all our original screens made from photos.  We will be teaching a class at Artistic Artifacts on March 7 to teach you how to use Photoshop Elements to transform a photo to a black and white image that can be used to make a Thermofax screen.  If you're interested in learning this process, please join us!

Turn Your Photos into Thermofax Screens!

It's been a while since we last taught Turn Your Photos into Thermofax Screens at Artistic Artifacts.   We are on the schedule for Saturday, March 7, from 1:30 PM - 4:30 PM, and would love for you to join us!  It is not necessary to have taken our screen printing class previously; this is a stand alone class.  If you haven't taken our screen printing class, we will be teaching that in May.  So taking the Photoshop class first would give you some time to prepare your own photos to turn into screens that you might then use in the printing class. Read on to learn more about this class.

We will show you how to use Photoshop Elements to convert a photo to a black and white image suitable for creating a Thermofax screen that can then be used in your art quilts or mixed media work.  In the photo above, you see the original photo of a sunflower, that flower converted to a black & white image, and then the screen used to print on fabric.  In this 3 hour class you will practice with some of our photos first and then work with your own to see how you can incorporate your own unique imagery into your work without concerns about copyright.  We'll also give you tips for taking photographs to make this process easier.  Soon you'll be looking at things with screen images in mind.  If you're in driving distance of the metropolitan DC area, come join us on March 7!

Note: While your own laptop and copy of Photoshop Elements are preferred, you can share one of our laptops if you don't have one, and download a trial copy of Photoshop Elements to try for 30 days before purchasing. Send us an email at pgfiber2art  @ gmail dot com if you have questions.

Happy New Year 2020!

As we turn the page on a new year, its a good time to refocus, looking back on the accomplishments of the previous year and making plans for the new one ahead of us.

We got our year rolling with a trip to Nashville for Quilt Con.  It was our second Quilt Con, and the first time to Nashville for both of us.  We thoroughly enjoyed Music City and Quilt Con!

In March we participated in the Creative Arts Business Summit to focus on our Thermofax screen business.  We always come away from this event with great ideas and tips from other creatives; unfortunately this was the last time for CABS.

The look back is the most surprising, to see how much was accomplished - more than we thought! Both of us spent a lot of time exploring cyanotype printing (you could say that was our focus for the year), and explored other techniques as well.  Here are some of our projects.

We debuted some new screens in the Etsy shop.  Sue used the Queen Anne's lace print in the center to make the fabric box below.

Elizabeth made this special pillow for her grandson Finn.

Sue took a class on making coiled rope baskets.  Here is the second one she made.  She also made a number of coasters with the same technique.

Summer was the time for cyanotype printing; we followed parallel paths with Elizabeth in New Hampshire and Sue in Virginia.  Elizabeth made numerous prints and combined 9 into this quilt top.

She also printed this scarf (displayed here on Molly the mannequin).

You'll see Sue's cyanotype quilt in the collage below (bottom left) which consists of 9 projects she worked on in 2019.  Top to bottom, left to right, the projects are Tea Bag Revival (12 x 12), Nature's Prints (12 x 12), Opposites Attract (10 x 10), Balloon Flowers (18 x 24), baby quilt (about 40" square), Gloria (16 x 20), cyanotype prints (35 x 42), 100 day prints which is unfinished (about 24 x 30), and the last is a memory quilt that is twin bed size, made from a child's clothes.

Sue also completed a number of charity quilts.  She organized the charity project for her guild's spring retreat, so in addition to completing a full size quilt that members made blocks for, she also used the leftover blocks to make 16 preemie quilts!  It was a great opportunity to  practice ruler quilting.

Last fall, Elizabeth took a class on eco printing in which she printed a silk scarf.  Here is one of the prints from the scarf.

And finally, Sue was proud to be included in 2 publications in 2019.  OurStory: Human Rights Stories in Fabric includes her Women's Voices Matter quilt. Inspired by Endangered Species includes her contribution of the Pink Fairy Armadillo.  Both are beautiful books and include amazing quilts with fabulous workmanship.  It is an honor to be included in both.  Exhibits of these quilts are both touring nationally. 

Wow!  That's a lot of stuff!  Will we be as productive in 2020?  Let's hope we can at least maintain the productivity. And what will be our focus this year?  You can expect to see more cyantopye printing, and probably some eco printing as well.  Of course, there will also be Thermofax printing.  Are you sensing a theme here?  It's safe to say we like printing of all types!  Follow us on Facebook and Instagram for pictures of our work throughout the year (search pgfiber2art).  What's on YOUR creative agenda for 2020?  Whatever it is, we hope you have a creative and fulfilling year!